What roles did men and women play in early modern witchcraft?
Ok, I’m going to treat this like its one of my early modern england history essays. So, here would be my plan: MEN – Higher forms of magick, accepted by society in forms of healers and apothacry. – Men were initially persecuted more than women, until witchcraft became a nationwide tale. – Men enforced laws against ‘malicium’ (a.k.a bad or hurtful magic), leading hunts and trials for individuals charged. WOMEN – Women traditionally held roles of witches or elemental spirits. – Women were the most frequent reporters of malificum, reporting to local authority of suspicious indivuals (however, this is to be noted that it was common place to just report an enemy). – Statistically more reported cases of females being persecuted for the deeds, but men have more severe cases. If you want to look up some good books, I recommend ‘The Witchcraft Reader’ by Darren Oldridge or ‘Strange Histories’ by Darren Oldridge. I would say go looking in the church courts, but I imagine that you won’t have acce
